Hello all!

I'm a new husky parent, and have never had much of a problem with fleas with my dogs in the past (greyhounds). D8 My 10-month-old girl came home with us already with fleas (we believe), and I have since given her a between-the-shoulder flea/tick treatment, and have given her a thorough bath with a flea shampoo. The bath seemed to have killed them off, but now I'm seeing flea dirt and the occasional flea on her underbelly again. What should I do next? I don't want to OVER treat her.

Yeah, you really don't want to over treat her. How soon after the topical was applied, did you bathe her?

Now you want to vacuum, vacuum, vacuum...like A LOT, food grade D.E. Powder (not the one for swimming pools) is good to sprinkle down too and is non-toxic so you can even massage it into her coat. Stuff is very very dusty though so just a heads up. Outside you can use the D.E as well, but once it gets wet, it won't work anymore. Others should chime in soon, so stay tuned for even more remedies that might work for you.

Ahh, and each time after you vacuum, empty the contents in the outside trash container.

Good luck! And welcome to the forum!

At the risk of sounding condescending, are you aware of the flea life cycle??  If you're not, or aren't sure, take a look at this WebMD link.  

What you're probably running into is the probable fact that you did kill the adult fleas and are now contending those that were eggs earlier.

As @artic_wind suggested, if you bathed her too soon, normally with a couple of days, of when you applied the topical - you probably washed the topical off.

Fleas are no fun, good luck ....

Yes, I was a groomer in a past life, I am familiar with flea life cycles and used to do flea baths as a part of my living. It's partially why I was surprised- both products, the monthly treatment AND the shampoo were supposed to kill eggs and larvae as well. The topical is supposed to continue to kill/repel for a month, the shampoo is supposed to kill/repel for about a week. Apparently not in this case. :/

I should have specified, to answer both of your questions, I waited 3-4 days after treating her with the monthly topical and then bathing her. That's typically considered more than enough time to let it soak in (I believe most are supposed to sit for at least 48 hours.)

I'll have to look into treating the carpets, ect.! I was hoping the monthly treatment would kill them at the source and keep her flea-toxic, but that hasn't been the case. Most of my house is tile, but the bedroom is carpet, so if they're festering anywhere, that'd be my guess.

I think the fleas now are more resistant. I've never ever had a flea problem til this past 2 years. I did everything. All my neighbors were dealing with it as well and most went to the oral flea meds. So, that is what I ended up doing and sure enough, in just a matter of hours, all itching stopped and while it really isn't possible that the fleas, eggs, and larvae in the carpets and outdoors were killed as well, I never saw another flea. I ended up using Nexgard, I liked this product cuz it kills ticks as well, many of the others don't. Flea season is winding down so you may be able to get a handle on it without going the oral/chewable route, I honestly HATED the idea of my dogs on these type products but at the same time, it was driving them crazy having fleas on them. I even got a little bonus with Kohdi...from the day I got him, whenever he got up from laying down, he'd spend like a minute itching, didn't matter the season, and I'm sure there were times when it wasn't even possible fleas could have been the cause, I just assumed he had dry skin, or it was his food, etc. since he's been on Nexgard, that itching has completely stopped. Can't really explain it but...whatever, I'm happy it's gone. Years ago I had a Malamute, same thing, he was put on a product called Program which basically just made the fleas sterile so they could lay no more eggs, he had flea allergies so severe that his skin was raw and he was chewing sores into himself and fur would be missing, once on Program, completely stopped.

If you are using permethrin for fleas, it's not very long lasting. Fipronil is an excellent adult flea killer in topical. I use vetguard plus which is permethrin plus pyriproxyphen alternating for the insect growth regulator. Fipronil for fleas is good for about 3 months, pyriproxyphen good for 4 months. Then i had permethrin alone every 6 weeks for ticks.

I recommend the DE on the coat, carpet, bedding, carpet, etc. Another thing you can use is essential oils, cedarwood oil is a great flea repellent that you can put on the dogs collar/bedding to repel fleas. Lavender oil and tea tree oil are also supposed to be good for repelling fleas but I have only ever used cedarwood oil on the collar/harness and tea tree oil shampoo. At least these are natural things that you don't have to worry about poisoning your dog with.